Teachers and Students

I am teaching at Seton Catholic College, Perth, this week, where my own sons attend school.  Yesterday the Year 9s tackled slip paper resist and Sgraffito (scratching through a layer of slip) and the whole idea of slip (liquid clay with or without colour).  With only 45 minutes to get the message across it became apparent the students had not worked a lot with clay till now, but, fortunately their art teachers are open to changing all that. Once released to get started, many of the students simply froze as they contemplated the tearing up of paper, the brushing on of slip.  It is really hard to put yourself back in the shoes of a 15 year old and the terror of getting it wrong.  I'd never be a teen again with all the angst and self doubt involved, bless 'em, give me wrinkles and some wisdom any day!  Oh, you already have.  One notices those students with leadership skills and those with avoidance skills, I wonder which one I was as a kid.  I told them to lighten up, be playful, just have a go and of course eventually they got right into it, just in time for the BELL.  AAARGh.  How do full time teachers do it?  Good management and planning I guess.  Everytime I visit a school I leave with renewed respect for teachers. I am heading back for more today.

At Seton we used Kathy King's work as a reference point - have you seen her work?  There is a great demo clip on Ceramic Arts Daily, but I must also show them the work of Gerry Wedd whose demonstration at POTober 2010 in Perth made me so interested in Sgraffito.  Here is Gerry's stuff ...

Gerry does a lot of sculptural stuff too but I love the unpreciousness of this piece.  He has a blog called Wedd Would.  His tiles are very 'him'.  Here is pays homage to Ken Price, ceramic innovator who died very recently.  Way to go Gerry!!